PetHub Helps Owners Track Down Lost Pets

Every dog owner’s nightmare would be to lose their pet. Some owners implant their pets with microchips or buy them GPS tracking collars, but PetHub is taking things to a whole new level. The company manufactures physical ID tags for pets that link to a free online profile of the animal. If a dog gets lost the person that found them will have numerous ways to locate the owners.

Dog owners can create their pet’s online profile with any information they want, including their microchip data, license and rabies tag information, medications they may be taking, and multiple contact numbers.

PetHub ID tags have a QR code that can be scanned with a smartphone to bring up the animals online profile. The person that finds the dog can also type the tag’s web address into any web browser, and newer smartphones can tap the tag as well. PetHub also has a 24-hour “Found Pet Hotline” that can be called at any time to receive information about a dog’s owner.

Once Tom Arnold, PetHub founder and CEO, realized how many pets go missing every year and how few are ever returned to their families, he decided to leave his job at Microsoft to address the issue in 2010. He had been thinking about the problem for years and was trying to come up with a way to help pet owners find their missing dogs and cats.

Photo: PetHub

Arnold began creating a business plan in 2009 and in early 2010 he started PetHub. It began in Seattle with a small team of interns from the University of Washington and a talented team of technology experts who were volunteering their time. The group began to design and build the PetHub website.

During this time, Arnold was feverishly researching other technologies that PetHub could use to help lost pets and their owners. It was late that summer when he discovered the QR code at a business seminar. He decided to work with a local laser etcher to perfect the product and filed for a patent immediately.

The site officially launched its first public version in November of 2010, and in no time they were well on the way to helping lost dogs find their way back home. The number of profiles on the site was steadily increasing too. Now, almost five years later PetHub offers a subscription service to users that sends out virtual lost pet posters to all the shelters in the area as soon as their owners input that they are missing.

The system also sends out an email to the dog owner that gives them the exact GPS location of where their pet was found. PetHub is the first GPS notification system that doesn’t require a big bulky collar.

Samantha’s biggest passion in life is spending time with her Boxer dogs. After she rescued her first Boxer in 2004, Samantha fell in love with the breed and has continued to rescue three other Boxers since then. She enjoys hiking and swimming with her Boxers, Maddie and Chloe.

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